


dreams we should be having

by valinors



Category: LOONA (Korea Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, Minor Character Death, author may or may not think feelings might be a little overrated
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-24
Updated: 2020-09-24
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:06:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26559424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/valinors/pseuds/valinors
Summary: [uni/college au; i thought i could find you here.]“Sounds like you’re quite a player, Heejin,” Hyunjin drawled.Heejin blushed. “It’s not like any of them got to know me,” she mumbled.“Well that’s dumb,” Hyunjin said, and Heejin stared.
Relationships: Jeon Heejin/Kim Hyunjin
Comments: 19
Kudos: 102





	dreams we should be having

**Author's Note:**

> title + quotes from siken because i'm unoriginal like that. tags can be important sometimes. ^-^ if i did something wrong, feel free to tell me. wouldn't be the first time lol.
> 
> :: 
>
>> I said kiss me here and here and here and you did.  
> Then you wanted pasta, so we trampled out into the tomatoes and rolled around to make the sauce.  
> You were very beautiful.  
> 

_Hey_.

This, she thinks, is how it always starts.

 _Hey, don’t ignore me._ A poke.

 _I’m not_.

_Can we go to the river?_

_Okay_.

Hyunjin holds out her hand, and Heejin wakes up.

::

“Good morning.”

Heejin sits up. “Good morning.”

“You overslept breakfast… so I brought back a muffin for you.”

“Thanks, but I’m not hungry.”

Heejin’s roommate Chaewon is sweet and well-meaning, if a little sarcastic sometimes. She doesn’t mind when Heejin oversleeps her alarms, and she tries hard not to judge Heejin for procrastinating all the time. Heejin can tell, because whenever Heejin is still scrambling to finish an assignment when Chaewon wakes up, Chaewon does this really specific sigh. She really should be a better roommate to Chaewon, considering Chaewon’s half the reason she hasn’t failed this semester.

“…Are you sure? Do you want something different? I can go–”

“I’m okay. I have something to do today anyways. I’ll get food on the way or something.”

“Where are you going? I can–”

Heejin closes the door before Chaewon can finish her sentence. She’s never really liked muffins anyways. Hyunjin did though.

::

Heejin officially met Hyunjin when she was sixteen. A little late, if you ask Heejin, considering they went to the same high school. But, she supposes, also a good thing, because Heejin didn’t lose most of her baby fat until she was fifteen. Hyunjin would disagree, probably, because Hyunjin always liked Heejin’s middle school photos.

They had met in the nurse’s office, Hyunjin already there, of course, because Hyunjin was always one step ahead of Heejin, even though Heejin was older by a month. Heejin is positive this is probably one of the worst ways to meet the love of your life, blinking back tears over a wrist you sprained because you tripped over your own feet and fell in a hallway. 

“Ms. Kim is with someone else right now if you’re looking for her.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“I’m Hyunjin. Heejin, right?”

“Y-Yeah.”

“I really liked your dance at last year’s talent show! Are you performing again this year?”

And that was all it took, really. Heejin left the nurse’s office with ice for her sprained wrist and Hyunjin by her side, carrying her book bag for her. 

“Can’t have you falling again and crying, can I? Your pain tolerance is so low, like a baby!” was all Hyunjin had said when Heejin had made an unintelligible noise at her when she came out of the nurse’s office and Hyunjin had been waiting for her. 

Heejin had been so shocked she hadn’t even answered.

 _Where are you now, then?_ Heejin wonders as she stares at herself in the grimy mirror of the girls’ washroom. She looks tired, but that’s not new. _I thought you knew I wasn’t good with pain_.

::

 _Hey_.

_Mhm?_

_Let’s go to the river. I’ll bring snacks._

_What do you want to do there?_

_Let’s pretend we’re on one of those dates._

This isn’t how it goes, she thinks, they never did this.

_Pretend?_

_Yeah, like in those films. We’ll be like those couples in those black and white films. Forever._

Hyunjin has a look in her eyes Heejin can’t identify, and Heejin wakes up before she can ask what Hyunjin really wants to say.

::

Somewhere in Heejin’s brain, the small minuscule part that isn’t thinking about Hyunjin, Heejin knows that Chaewon is probably right to be worried. She hasn’t really been eating, she comes back home late on the days she does leave their room, and she can’t remember the last time she attended a class. She hears Chaewon sometimes, whispering to Hyejoo and Yerim about how worried she is for Heejin when she thinks Heejin’s asleep. They’re back today, murmuring things Heejin can’t quite catch from underneath her covers.

Heejin waits until she hears Chaewon leave with them before getting out of bed. She sits at her desk, mindlessly sifting through the mess of papers, an unfinished essay left mid-sentence. _I should finish that_ , she thinks. Her phone buzzes, screen lighting up to reveal a picture of her and Hyunjin. _Maybe I should change that too_ , she thinks. She unlocks her phone and then pauses, finger hovering. There are photos on her phone that aren’t of her and Hyunjin, she knows this. And yet. 

_Maybe later_ , she thinks, turning off her phone. Maybe she should nap first.

::

If Heejin was going to be absolutely honest, she would never have become friends with Hyunjin if it had been left completely up to her. Hyunjin and her had always existed in two different circles at school, and well, truth be told, Heejin was _never_ someone to initiate. Even if, _maybe_ , she’d wanted to be friends with Hyunjin ever since that day in the nurse’s office.

“I didn’t know you knew Hyunjin,” Jungeun said bemusedly after watching a beet-red Heejin wave back at Hyunjin one day.

Heejin decided not to mention her recently developed habit of attending school basketball games. “I… I don’t, really,” Heejin mumbled. “We met in the nurse’s office the day I tripped in the hallway.”

Jungeun snickered. “I remember that. That was funny. You squawked.”

“Why are you being mean?” Heejin complained.

“Jungie’s always mean! Why is Jungeun mean this time?” a voice chirped from behind, and Heejin turned to see Jiwoo behind them.

“Jungeun’s making fun of the time I tripped in the hallway and fell,” Heejin pouted.

Jiwoo laughed. “Well… it was funny,” she said sheepishly when Heejin glared. 

“I need new friends,” Heejin lamented as they started walking home.

“You can be friends with Hyunjin,” Jungeun said, smirking.

Heejin felt her cheeks redden and burrowed her nose into her scarf so her friends couldn’t see. “I don’t know how to,” she said, her voice muffled.

“Speak up I can’t hear you!” Jiwoo shouted into her ear, and both Jungeun and Heejin flinched. 

“I said, I don’t know how to,” Heejin repeated, raising her voice.

“You don’t know how to… make friends?” Jungeun asked, puzzled.

Heejin cringed. “You don’t have to put it like _that_. I know how to make friends, I just… don’t know how to become friends with Hyunjin.” 

As one, Jungeun and Jiwoo turned towards her, and Heejin knew what they were going to say before they said it. “You like Hyunjin!” they both exclaimed, and Jiwoo’s smile was just a little too big for Heejin to trust it.

“No, I don’t! I barely even know her!” Heejin retorted. “She’s just… intimidating.”

Jungeun stared in confusion. “Hyunjin… is intimidating to you? Are you scared of puppies too now?”

“No!” Heejin was definitely blushing now. “Hyunjin just seems… more. Like she’s meant for more.” _Like she deserves more_ , Heejin thought.

Jiwoo had smiled unnervingly wide at that, and the next day Heejin had almost died drinking water when Hyunjin had sat down next to her at lunch. 

“What… What are you doing here?” Heejin sputtered out after she had finished coughing.

“Jiwoo asked me to sit with you guys at lunch,” Hyunjin said, staring at her with something akin to concern. “Are you okay?”  
  
“Yep! I’m okay. Totally fine. All good.” Heejin wanted the ground to swallow her whole.

Hyunjin only shrugged before smiling. “Are you going to the basketball game on Friday?”

“Jiwoo and I were trying to convince her before you came,” Jungeun piped up, like the liar she was.

They had been talking about the upcoming talent show before Heejin had almost coughed out her entire respiratory system. Which, Heejin noted with fury, Jungeun had done nothing about despite having bragged about her CPR certification all summer.

Heejin kicked a leg out in Jungeun’s direction underneath the table, glaring. She missed, because the universe hated her, and kicked Jiwoo by accident instead. Jiwoo swiftly responded with a sharp kick of her own, and now Heejin was nursing not only a bruised ego but a bruised shin.

Heejin glared at Jiwoo instead, who only smiled brightly in response.

“I… I was thinking about going,” Heejin explained, distinctly aware her voice sounded strained and in pain. _Lies,_ the ticket Heejin had bought before her first class seemed to whisper and Heejin shifted uncomfortably under Hyunjin’s gaze.

“Well you should come! We’ll win for sure! We’re on a winning streak!” Hyunjin exclaimed, seemingly oblivious to the entire incident.

“That’s so cool! Did you know that, Heejin? Now you have to go!” Jiwoo said, voice rising several octaves as she looked pointedly towards Heejin.

“I-I didn’t know that,” Heejin lied through her teeth, shoving aside the thought of her growing pile of game tickets in her bedside drawer.

“Jungeun and I will be going too so you can sit with us,” Jiwoo said with a smile that was probably meant to be encouraging.

Which it would have been, had Heejin not known that Jungeun had never, and would never, go to a basketball game. Heejin seethed. But she wasn’t going to say no in front of Hyunjin, because Heejin liked to think she still had some dignity to salvage.

“Okay,” Heejin managed out before Hyunjin grabbed her hand excitedly.

 _Our hands fit together,_ she thought absentmindedly, staring at their hands and then at Hyunjin while Hyunjin had begun explaining the rules of the game to her.

She had mentioned it to Hyunjin after the basketball game, in an embarrassing ramble where she had also revealed she’d been to most of Hyunjin’s games. Hyunjin had smiled, eyes turning into crescents, and replied cheekily, saying, “That means we’re meant to be together, right?”

Heejin had sputtered, lost for words and cheeks red, and hit Hyunjin’s backside with her fists as Hyunjin had only laughed.

 _I’m all alone now,_ Heejin thinks tiredly as she pulls her covers over her head and closes her eyes. _I thought you said we were meant to be together._

::

_Hey._

_Hey._

_Can we go to the river?_

_No._

This isn’t how it went, she thinks, but maybe this is how it should have gone.

_Please?_

_No, I don’t want to._

_What about the park?_

_No, I don’t want to go out. Let’s watch a film here instead._

Hyunjin kisses her as the credits roll, and Heejin wakes up with her heart aching.

::

“Heejin,” someone says, and Heejin thinks, for a split second, that it’s Hyunjin.

It’s not, of course, and Heejin doesn’t want to wake up.

“Heejin,” the person says again, and Heejin blinks away the remains of yet another nap.

This feels familiar. “Haseul? Is something wrong?”

“Chaewon was worried about you. Everyone is,” Haseul says, and Heejin hates the voice Haseul is using. “She says you haven’t gone to classes in a while. That you’re not eating. I wanted to check on you.”

“I’m just tired,” Heejin says, sitting up.

“Do you want me to talk to your advisor for you? I can–”

Heejin cuts her off. “No. I’ll get my act together, I promise. I just… I needed some time.” Her phone screen lights up from her bedside table and Heejin knows Haseul’s seen the photo of her and Hyunjin. “I’ve been meaning to change that,” she says, hastily picking up her phone. “I’ll change it right now.”

Haseul tugs the phone out of her hands gently. “Why don’t we go eat something instead. I’ll pay. You can change it later, when we come back.”

Heejin stares at Haseul for a moment. “Okay,” she relents. “Just for a bit.”

::

It had been embarrassingly easy, falling in love with Hyunjin. Heejin fell in love with Hyunjin the way everyone else who met Hyunjin did, and then some.

“Remember when Heejin said she was in love with the girl who took the same bus route as her?”

“Or the boy who sat beside her once during assembly?”

“Why do you have to say it like that?” Heejin whined, glancing quickly towards Hyunjin, who was clearly amused by Jungeun and Jiwoo.

“Sounds like you’re quite a player, Heejin,” Hyunjin drawled.

Heejin blushed. “It’s not like any of them got to know me,” she mumbled.

“Well that’s dumb,” Hyunjin said, and Heejin stared.

“What–Wait–What…?” Heejin managed, but Hyunjin had already turned back to Jungeun and Jiwoo.

“Tell me more about Heejin!” Hyunjin had exclaimed as if she hadn’t just made Heejin’s heart race, and that was probably the first time Heejin fell in love with Hyunjin.

Jungeun and Jiwoo weren’t wrong, not really. Heejin had a tendency to fall in love with people everywhere, constantly. It was easy, like breathing. A smile, a nice gesture, a hand outstretched. Heejin fell in love with strangers like she would see them again. It was only natural that Heejin would fall in love with Hyunjin too, headfirst and all too willing.

Heejin had told Hyunjin once, during the credit scene of a film with a voice a little unsteady and a lot in love, that she had probably fallen love with Hyunjin when they first met. She just didn’t know it.

Hyunjin had stared, and for a moment Heejin had thought Hyunjin was going to make a joke, but Hyunjin had only gripped her hand tighter and said, steadily and quietly, “Thank you for loving me.”

 _Who am I going to love now?_ Heejin wonders, staring out the passenger window in Haseul’s car. _I wasn’t done loving you._

::

_Hey._

Something feels different, she thinks, something is terribly wrong in this dream.

 _Don’t ignore me, Heejin!_ A nudge.

_I’m not._

_Let’s go to the river._

_I don’t want to._

_Please?_

_No! I don’t want to go to the river ever again._

_Why not?_

_I hate it, I hate the river._

_No, you don’t, come on._

_I do! I hate it and–and I hate you!_

Hyunjin stares at her, hurt, and Heejin wakes up crying.

::

“Do you think I was enough?”

Haseul sets her book down. “What do you mean?”

Heejin swallows the lump in her throat and stares at the essay she’s supposed to be working on. She promised Haseul she’d finish it after they ate. “Do you think I loved her enough?”

“Of course, why–”

“I told her once that I hated her,” Heejin whispers. “We were fighting. It was about something small and it spiralled. We both said things we didn’t mean but I made it worse. I said that I hated her and that I never wanted to see her again. And there was a moment after I said that, where I meant it.”

“You didn’t mean it, Heejin.”

“But I _did_. Because I do things like that. I fuck things up when they’re good because something always feels wrong when everything is good, and Hyunjin made a lot of things good. And I’m not… I _know_ Hyunjin wasn’t perfect. Hyunjin didn’t take certain things seriously when she should have. She forgot things a lot, like doctor appointments and when her assignments were due. She wasn’t good at saying I love you and she only talked about her feelings when she had to. But she was _good_.”

Heejin swipes angrily at the tears falling. “She was good, and I knew that none of it would last because who meets the person they want to spend the rest of their life with when they’re sixteen? It was too good to be true. I was always waiting for something to happen, for me to fuck it up, for something to ruin us. I worried about her all the time. I was always worried she’d leave me behind, like she would get tired of me one day. Whenever we fought, I’d wonder if this was it, if this was how we would end. And I didn’t mean what I said then, after that moment. But just for a moment I did. And now she’s gone, and I can’t take it back.”

Heejin looks up at Haseul, who has been silent this whole time. “Sometimes I hate her now, too. I see her when I fall asleep, and I have all these things I want to say but none of them are the right things to say. What do you say to someone who went somewhere you can’t follow?”

::

This is how it really went:

Heejin picks up the call on the first ring and doesn’t even get a chance to say hello.

“Heejin! Let’s go somewhere after your essay. I’m tired of school. Enough school!”

Heejin hums, staring at the essay prompt on her laptop screen. “Okay. Where do you want to go?”

“I haven’t gotten that far,” Hyunjin admits.

Heejin snorts. “Did you have anything in mind?”

“I just wanted to. Something about spontaneity.”

“Is everything okay? Are you okay? You’re not thinking about dropping everything to fly across the world again, are you?”

“That was once!” Hyunjin protests.

Heejin laughs. “Okay. After this stupid essay we can go somewhere. I miss you.”

“You’re dumb,” Hyunjin says, but Heejin can hear the smile in her voice.

“You’re so mean to me,” Heejin complained. “I love you.”

“Yes, yes.”

“Say it back!”

A laugh. “I’ll say it when I sweep you off your feet after your essay.”

Except Hyunjin hadn’t said it back, because Hyunjin had gone and never came back.

 _No_ , Heejin thinks, _that wasn’t the part that hurt the most_.

::

Haseul had told Heejin two days later, waking Heejin from an afternoon nap. Haseul had stumbled a little, tongue tripping over words that don’t come naturally when you’re only a RA, words that don’t sound right when you’re alive.

“Heejin, let’s sit down.” Haseul’s voice had been soft and gentle, and Heejin had wondered what she had looked like then, had wondered why the world didn’t look any different than it had a minute before.

But Heejin hadn’t sat down, had headed to the washroom instead. She had stared at the mirror, and she hadn’t cried then, even though she thought she would. Then she had gone back to her room, where she had left Haseul, and asked if Haseul thought her professor would be willing to give her an extension on her essay. Haseul had floundered a little at that, and Heejin couldn’t really blame her.

She’d gone to classes too, leading up to the day she had to leave for the funeral. It had been strange, watching the people go on with their lives, even though it felt like hers had been paused. There were rumours, of course, but Heejin didn’t pay a lot of attention.

Heejin didn’t cry until after Hyunjin was well and truly gone, when she had come back to her room after the funeral and seen Hyunjin everywhere in her room, in her bed, at her desk, in the hoodies Hyunjin had left behind saying she would come back for. She had thought about how Hyunjin had never taken her out on that date, about how unfair it all was, because Hyunjin was supposed to _be here_. Heejin had cried then, loud, ugly sobs reeking of grief, and that was how Chaewon had found her.

::

_Hey._

_Let’s go to the river._

_How did you know I was going to ask that?_

_I didn’t. I just missed you. We can watch a film instead if you want. I’ll go to the convenience store with you. Spend time with me. I don’t care what we do._

_Okay. Let’s do it._

_Do what? Which one?_

_All of them, silly. We have forever, don’t we?_

::

**Author's Note:**

> You said _Will you love me even more when I’m dead?_  
>  and I said _No_ , and I threw the pills on the sand.  
>  _Look at them_ , you said. _They look like emeralds._  
>  \- siken


End file.
